Having each of the Best Director nominees go around and say what they like about each other's films could have been super phony and circle-jerky, but I found this really lovely and authentic, in addition to being fascinating. This year's crop of nominees seems exceptionally classy and humble. I loved hearing Jordan Peele's description of the New Year's Eve scene from Phantom Thread, Greta Gerwig's description of scenes from The Shape of Water, and PTA exclaiming "How the fuck did [Christopher Nolan] do that?" in response to every scene from Dunkirk. I also love that in the midst of all of the bullshit of awards season they're able to turn the conversation back to craft and artistry--i.e., to the nuts and bolts of what makes these films so good.

Ribs wrote:She was going to win anyway, the whole “winning competitive Oscar the same year as an Honorary one” is a tough narrative to beat. Frankly I don’t really see how this one thing would convince somebody to change their vote!

I think all she needs to win is for people to see the film. Regardless of the relative quality of the other nominees, it would be hard to sit through Visages, Villages and not want to give the woman a prize.

Absolutely agree. I dragged my dad to see this when I was visiting home over the holidays and he loved it despite hating the other Varda films he's seen (and, with the exception of Tati, pretty much all postwar French cinema). That convinced me of its universal appeal.

ianthemovie wrote:Having each of the Best Director nominees go around and say what they like about each other's films could have been super phony and circle-jerky, but I found this really lovely and authentic, in addition to being fascinating. This year's crop of nominees seems exceptionally classy and humble. I loved hearing Jordan Peele's description of the New Year's Eve scene from Phantom Thread, Greta Gerwig's description of scenes from The Shape of Water, and PTA exclaiming "How the fuck did [Christopher Nolan] do that?" in response to every scene from Dunkirk. I also love that in the midst of all of the bullshit of awards season they're able to turn the conversation back to craft and artistry--i.e., to the nuts and bolts of what makes these films so good.

For as much as I disliked The Shape of Water and found it too derivative and creepy and superfluous to be anything I ever want to revisit, it is definitely not something I'd be crestfallen about winning because of del Toro and Hawkins. That clip is a good reminder of why. Now, Three Billboards on the other hand...

My favorite part of that vid is when Peele is recounting meeting PTA, and telling him that he loved Phantom Thread, and having to tell him that he saw the movie via a screener. PTA chuckles a bit, but Nolan busts out laughing, probably indicating PTA's attitude on the subject better than PTA's own reaction.

The whole thing is worth watching, though, if anyone's on the fence about committing 20 minutes to it. I also liked how Gerwig's favorite moments from each of the other films were so specific, not just which moments she liked, but her reactions to them.

Yes - her tone is mushy and generous enough to send Black Hat into a mental hospital, but the examples she gave are inspired and not just the sort of generalized observations of the films that anyone could offer. Her example for Dunkirk is the best moment in the film.

Wow, that director's video is great. One of the interesting things, to me- PT Anderson's physical presence is very like Day Lewis's in the movie- simultaneously showing a sense of power but a sense of shyness as well, sort of long limbed but bunched into himself- and his voice almost sounds a bit like alike, the American-ness of the accent lessened significantly. I'm wondering if they wound up mirroring one another- and if so, if it was Day Lewis doing Anderson in the movie (which would scan, as it's fairly easy to read Day Lewis as creator as being a stand in for Anderson as creator) or if Anderson picked up Day Lewis's mannerisms on set, or some combination thereof.

Matrix - having spent a good deal of time in Anderson's company recently thanks to that wonderful Demme retrospective at BAM, I thought the same thing regarding Woodcock's mannerisms - the crossed leg, the sort of amused but contained energy, and like you said - bunched into himself. Still think Anderson would prefer the film not be read as a 1:1 analogue for his personality or his life, but it's still kind of a perfect choice on Day Lewis' part.

I hope it’s not Dunkirk. Between Darkest Hour and Dunkirk, I didn’t understand Dunkirk. It’s a fine battle picture, but it’s very, very confusing. They constantly switch between night and day. I wasn’t familiar with Dunkirk in my history, and I didn’t know it’s in France. And they never explained it.

Each year I sign up, and somehow I always fail to see enough films. All the foreign films should be streamed and made available to the Academy members who sign up for the Foreign Film committee. (We have the technology to do this now.) The current system is very undemocratic. The films are only available/convenient to a small group of Academy members. (A tiny portion of the Academy actually vote for the foreign films.) Showing two films a night is very unfair. The second film — shown at 9 pm — barely stands a chance, as most people have left by then! Then there is process of how the films are chosen by their own countries, which is undemocratic and political. There needs to be a complete overhaul of the foreign-film nomination process.

Widely expected winner, as it's a very BAFTAs movie. The last BP overlap was four years ago.

There's been a good deal of gossip over the past few days from a lot of prominent awards journalists that both Dunkirk and Get Out are over performing in their straw polling of Academy members but that Three Billboards and Shape of Water still seem to have more than enough support to put it over the top. It seems, at the least, Lady Bird's fallen out of consideration and is looking likely to not win any prizes altogether. So the race seems to have narrowed, if just a little.

(There was another interesting tweet from Kris Tapley of Variety that an upset to watch out for is Manville, which piqued my curiosity too)

A Manville/Oldman double-header would be nice (more that GO is going to win anyway, but Manville does loads of great, unrewarded work). Perhaps Alan Clarke's BFI boxset would suddenly get a lot of order requests from Hollywood?

Ronan and Metcalf have been topping those categories in just about every poll. I'm not a huge fan of the film, but even for me, their performances were certainly worth watching and would be deserving of any accolades coming their way.

This is a gigantic bummer. I saw Call Me by Your Name over the weekend and the nominated song is tremendous. Not to see it on the telecast in favor of what's sure to be some animated film horseshit is going to be a bitter pill.

I'm no Antony/ANOHNI fan but I was surprised when the Academy declined to let her perform a few years back, given the historic nomination for a transgendered performer. She ended up refusing to go to the ceremony but inexplicably the Twitter Outrage Brigade didn't really give a shit. Guess she wasn't famous enough for them either

I’d just take the article for what it was: a week after nominations, they hadn’t asked him. Unless somebody asked Gael Garcia Bernal if they asked him to perform Remember Me at that point it doesn’t mean he’s not going to perform the song. Oscars gonna Oscars, but I really don’t imagine the Producers are so out of touch to think that there isn’t a continengent of millenial viewership actively interested in his success and performance who don’t know who Mary J. Blige is.